Saturday, May 31, 2014

And so it
came to pass that Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki was sacrificed to
preserve the status quo. As is often the case, such resignations are a way of
moving an issue from the front page to the back page, as it were, and from
there people lose interest and genuine reforms are stymied. But by then no one
really notices or cares. And so ABC news reports:

“In this crisis, it became clear to the
White House that the solution to the problems identified in news accounts and
in a damning report from the VA's inspector general were endemic and would take
time to turn around, let alone correct.”

Ah
yes, those “endemic” problems that “take time to turn around” and “correct.”
So, the message is: Don’t expect anything much to happen with regard to genuine
reform at the VA. After all, the problems are “endemic” and we all have some to
know that government and our politicians cannot deal with such problems, to say
nothing of solving them. You would think, though, that after awhile people
would catch on and replace those politicians who treat problems as “endemic.”

But,
hey, we know that administration is trying. For, after all, Shinseki has been
sacrificed despite the facts that he “is a very good man," Obama said . .
.”I don't just mean he's an accomplished man. I don't just mean that he's been
an outstanding soldier. He's a good person who's done exemplary work on our
behalf." Oh, isn’t life so demanding at the top?

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Below is a
link to an article that appeared in the NY Times,on May 26th, entitled “Veterans
Fire Back at Letter by Senator,” referring to an open letter sent by Senator
Richard Burr, R-NC, to the nation’s veterans criticizing the leaders of some
veterans groups because, allegedly, they have sold out during the current
scandal. This is so, apparently, because only the American Legion has called
for Eric Shinseki to step down as head of the Veterans’ Administration.

Now, while
I look favorably on any action that would get Shinseki out, as this seems
justified as this scandal unfolds, it is important that Burr’s actions have
other consequences as well, viz., dividing veterans’ organizations and attempting
to marginalize some of them, while making the American Legion seem
“mainstream.” Why would Burr seek to do this? Because it is a way of dividing
those who are protesting the loudest at the treatment – or actually the lack of
treatment – of the nation’s veterans. And why seek to do this? To deflect these
protests, which are of course directed at the current political class, both
Republicans and Democrats, as they should be. And as these protests have the
potential to undermine the current political class, given the heartless and
shameful treatment of the nation’s veterans, Burr’s actions are intended to
preserve the status quo.

So it is
quite ironic that Burr is accusing these veteran groups of serving the status
quo. To wit: “Mr. Burr, angry that only the American Legion
has called for the resignation of the veterans affairs secretary, Eric
Shinseki, accused the groups of being “more interested in defending the status
quo within V.A., protecting their relationships within the agency, and securing
their access to the secretary and his inner circle” than in helping members.”
And it is not at all surprising that these groups have responded as angrily as
they have, given the utterly shameful charges levied by Burr.

But
leaving aside momentarily the particular issue here, what is interesting to me
is how the powers that be try to manipulate events, control story lines, in
order to maintain the status quo. This particular example illustrates this as
well as anything could because, it seems to me, the current political class
senses their vulnerability should this issue of how they have manipulated the
care – or lack thereof – of war veterans “go viral.”

Monday, May 26, 2014

Below is a
link to an article in Politico dealing with the scandal involving the Veterans’
Administration and especially VA hospitals. Here are a couple of paragraphs
from that article:

Unlike in October, when Republicans focused their message on calling for
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to be fired, they’ve gone
broader now, saying this is about more than VA Secretary Eric Shinseki, whom
most have avoided calling on to resign or be fired.
This, they say, is much, much bigger: The phrase that House Speaker John
Boehner (R-Ohio) and his colleagues have been emphasizing is “systemic
failure.”

Now, don’t be fooled by the language here, that the Republicans have “gone
broader now, saying this is about more than VA Secretary Eric Shinseki….” What
this means is that the Republicans, for reasons not specified, don’t want to
focus on the VA and the scandalous activities that have been taking place at
their hospitals. Hence, they “have avoided calling on [Shinseki] to resign or
be fired.” This is classic redirection and the question, not addressed by
Politico or anyone else I have read, is, Why?

I
am not at all sure but I will hazard the guess that this is because both the
Republicans and Democrats have no intention of actually working to solve these
problems or to reform the VA. Hence, even a dissenter with the credentials of
Bernie Sanders, of Vermont, has said that "by and large, the quality that
veterans receive in this country is good to excellent." And this quote
appeared in an article entitled “Miller: VA Scandal ‘Much Larger’ Than
Shinseki,” which also appeared in Politico, referring to the chairman of the
House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, Jeff Miller (R-Fla).

Of course, those being “served” by
the VA know that this is all just part of an effort to avoid dealing with this
issue. These veterans know, in other words, that even those who claim to care
most for our military are willing to screw them over once again when they leave
military service. And no one with any power objects. But then why should we be
surprised?

Thursday, May 22, 2014

A rather
simple phenomenon became clear to me just recently, viz., why our
“conservatives” are not, that is, are not and cannot be “conservatives” on
their own terms. These people are “oligarchs,” not “conservatives.

Why aren’t
our contemporary “conservatives” actually conservatives, that is, supporters as
they claim to be of “small,” less powerful, and less intrusive government?
Because they are advocates of inequality. And when inequality or, rather,
inequalities exist, small, less powerful, less intrusive government is just not
feasible. Why not? Because inequalities, always and everywhere, whether social,
economic, racial, or sexual, breed resentment and resentment breeds civil
unrest, resistance, even rebellion. Hence, government, large, powerful, and
intrusive government is necessary, even essential.

The
evidence? Take an extreme form of inequality, slavery of any variety. Without a
large, powerful, and intrusive government, slavery of any form cannot exist. The
equation: More inequality = more government. More equality = less government. And
there is no getting around this formula.

This helps
explain why those who are labeled “liberals” support a humongous bureaucracy.
They do so because they recognize that the pursuit of great wealth produces
significant inequalities and their hope, utterly vain, is that the bureaucracy
can ameliorate these inequalities, thereby preserving social stability. This
also clarifies the “quirk” in contemporary “conservatism” whereby although “conservatives”
claim they want “to get the government off the backs of the American people,”
they end up supporting and even extending the reach of our pervasively powerful
national government, e.g., NSA spying or the reach of the FBI. Of course, they
justify this as necessary for protecting “national security” which is OK so
long as it is remembered that “national security” can be undermined by internal
“threats” like black power, communists, “socialists,” or labor unions.

Today’s
“conservatives” – and even today’s “liberals” – are actually “oligarchs,”
seeking ways to support while ameliorating the effects of inequalities, and especially
economic inequality. And as oligarchs, they end up supporting large, powerful,
and intrusive government. They have no choice. The best they can do is disguise
their acceptance of a pervasively powerful government as necessary for “protecting
national security,” or for sanitizing or cleansing society, say, of drugs or
crime or both, or for defending “traditional social arrangements.” But the
bottom line is: our political class is oligarchic and, hence, must support and
even extend the leviathan that exists is Washington, D.C. To expect a different
result, even or especially from our “conservatives,” is to delude ourselves.

Saturday, May 17, 2014

“The American people today are tired of disorder,
disruption, and disrespect for the law. America wants to come back to the law
as a way of life, and as we do come back to the law, the memory of this great
man, who never left the law as a way of life, will be accorded even more
honor….” [The Subversives, p. 492]

Why is this
so funny? Because these are the words of President Richard Nixon, honoring J. Edgar
Hoover at Hoover’s funeral in the year 1972, or shortly before Nixon had to
resign the presidency because of his illegal acts and not all that long before
the nation learned of the extent of Hoover’s disrespect for the law. You can’t make stuff
like this up.

"Paul has met with donors including the staunchly
pro-Israel mega-donor Paul Singer; Wall Street types like Emil Henry, a former
George W. Bush Treasury official, and last month a gathering of former Romney
backers; he has spoken with people with Republican Jewish Coalition, an
organization strongly opposed to a nuclear-armed Iran, in part out of concern
for what that would mean for Israel. Paul has appeared at pro-defense
bastions such as The Citadel in South Carolina; one professor there, Mallory
Factor, has publicly gone to bat for Paul. And he has brought on Lorne
Craner, a longtime aide to GOP Sen. John McCain, to serve as one of his foreign
policy advisers. He has also gone to Israel since entering the Senate and
impressed some observers at the time with his enthusiasm" (http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=5F84CA93-88F6-4311-9AB4-3C6FB45F8285).

“OK. There is nothing here, I suspect, that distinguishes Paul from
others, except some rather vague assertions that are meant to placate, not the
imperialists as the article contends, but rather those labelled
"isolationists." As long as Paul is coming on like a
"balancer," seeking to balance "involvement" with some
"disengagement," "involvement" will prevail. That is what
"balancing" is meant to do: It is, in actuality, a disguise for involvement,
making it look like the person is actually calculating whether to be involved
or not.

“Look at it this way: In constitutional law circles, there is a
concept labelled "balancing," viz., balancing individual rights, say
the freedom of expression, against the good of society. Well, guess what
happens? Yeah, the "balance" almost always tips in favor of the good
of society, the exceptions being when the "threat" posed by the
assertion of individual rights is minimal. So "balancing" a way of
limiting or restricting rights while pretending to be concerned with their
protection.

“I suspect Paul's foreign policy "evolution," as one
person described him, is of the same character. I also suspect that the powers
that be know this and express their "concerns" about Paul to make us
think that there is a real debate about foreign policy going on when, in fact,
there is not. And insofar as Paul "evolves" into a
"realist," then "realism" and its credentials are
strengthened. "See, folks, there is no sensible alternative to 'realism,'
as the evolution of Rand Paul illustrates!" And the status quo is not only
preserved but fortified, even while the political class pretends to be debating
alternatives. These guys in the political class are shrewd. Of course, they are
nothing but shrewd but we Americans are convinced that that is enough, aren't
we?”

"When will we ever learn? When will we ever learn?" [Song:
"Where Have All the Flowers Gone?"]

Thursday, May 15, 2014

A
museum dedicated to the attack on 9/11 was opened and, among others, President
Obama spoke. This is part of what he had to say.

“President Obama on Thursday dedicated
the long-awaited museum commemorating the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, with a
mournful elegy to the victims, a stirring tribute to the heroes and a firm
resolve to never let terrorists shatter the spirit of America.” [NY Times, May
15, 2014]

Here
is what confuses me: How could terrorists ever “shatter the spirit of America?”
I mean, the shattering of “our” spirit is not something that can be
accomplished by any attack, no matter how devastating – and certainly the
attack on 9/11 was hardly a terribly devastating one except psychologically.
But “the spirit” of a nation is not “shattered” by attacks, as you would think
we would understand by now, that is, post WWII and post Vietnam, where the US
thought that it could, via massive bombings, “shatter” the spirit or undermine
the resolve of our enemies.

So
why this foolishness from the president? After all, he is not a fool. Well, it
is because he has to make something out of 9/11 that it wasn’t. Or, perhaps, I
should say that he has to continue to
make something out of 9/11 it wasn’t. After all, 9/11 wasn’t even an attack
that was part of a broader war on the U.S. as evidenced by the fact that we
have not been attacked since and any apparent attacks were rather more like
eccentricities than parts of a broader war being controlled by a few enemy
leaders. But this doesn’t sit well as we in the U.S. obsess over that attack.
It seems we have to think that, for example, nothing was the same after the
9/11 attacks and this, even though, as Putin has reminded us, things are pretty
much the same as they have always been.

Obama’s
rhetoric reminds me of the rhetoric used when the Boston Marathon was run this
year and it was said that Boston was being quite “defiant” in holding the
marathon. But who were the Bostonians defying? One of the bombers was dead, the
other was in custody and the mother was somewhere in central Europe still
claiming, I imagine, that her sons had been scapegoated by the U.S. government.
Apparently, there was no one Bostonians were defying but they had to think there
were others threatening to bomb the marathon again or their feelings would seem
more narcissistic than would otherwise be the case.

The
president also said:

“No act of terror can match the
strength or the character of our country,” Mr. Obama told a crowd that included
family members of those slain and other invited guests in the cavernous
underground hall of the National September 11 Memorial Museum. “Like the great
wall and bedrock that embrace us today,” he added, “nothing can ever break us.
Nothing can change who we are as Americans.”

True enough, Mr. President, but its
truthfulness is matched by its triteness. No,
“nothing can break us. Nothing can change who we are as Americans.” But some
might say: Too bad because some change in who we are as Americans might actually
improve us.Just sayin’.

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Immediately
below, some interesting passages from an essay on the American empire and its
current state. The link follows the quotations.

“The U.S.A. accounts for close to 40% of the
world’s military expenditures, compared to some 10% by China and 5.5% by
Russia. The Aerospace and Defense Industry contributes close to 3% oi GDP
and is the single largest positive contributor to the nation’s balance of
trade. America’s three largest arms companies—Lockheed Martin, Northrop
Grumman, and Boeing—are the world’s largest, employing some 400,000 hands, and
all but corner the world’s market in their “products.” Of late defense
contracting firms have grown by leaps and bounds in a nation-empire
increasingly loathe to deploy conventional boots on the ground. These
corporate contractors provide an ever greater ratio of contract support field
personnel, many of them armed, over regular army personnel. Eventually,
in Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom
private contract and regular military personnel were practically on a par.

“This hasty evocation of the tip of America’s
military iceberg is but a reminder of President Dwight Eisenhower’s
forewarning, in 1961, of an “immense military establishment” in lockstep with
“a large arms industry. . . [acquiring] unwarranted influence, whether sought
or unsought,” injurious to democracy. At the time Ike could hardly have
imagined the gargantuan growth and political weight of this military-industrial
complex or the emergence, within it, of a corporate-contract mercenary army.”

Monday, May 12, 2014

Below is a
link to an article in the NY Times about how a Christian legal group, Alliance
Defending Freedom, has won some cases defending what they see as “religious
freedom,” such as the recent case in which the Supreme Court said that the town
of Greece, N.Y. can begin its public meetings with a public prayer. The article
also points out that this group is hoping for a victory in the Hobby Lobby
case, where it is being argued that forcing companies to provide birth control
as part of its health insurance is a violation of “religious freedom.”

Well, this
is correct: Forcing companies to do such a thing when it violates the religious
principles of the owners is a violation of religious freedom. Hence, the
Supreme Court might well side with the Alliance Defending Freedom. But that is
a long, long way from getting us where the Alliance – and others – would like
us to go, viz., to a nation that puts religion ahead of politics. And in my not
so humble opinion, this nation will never go there because it is, fundamentally
and deeply, committed to a secular view of religion, a view which is embedded
in the very Constitution the Alliance appeals to in order to defend religious
freedom.

What is
labeled “the separation of church and state” is actually “the separation of
religion and politics.” Moreover, this “separation” was created as a way of
subordinating religion to politics or of religion to the secular. Evidence of
this? Well, most simply put: It is the state, the government that decides how
far the freedom of religion extends against the demands of the political, the
secular. So, the government can decide that all will serve in the nation’s
armed forces if that is what it thinks best. There is no constitutional right
of “conscientious objection,” not even for Quakers. Moreover, the government
decides if parents have the right not to treat their children medically when
their lives are at stake. Again, there is no constitutional right to refuse
medical treatment for one’s children. There is even no constitutional right not
to send your children to public school, at least through the grades that
precede high school, as decided in Yoder
v. Wisconsin, where the Court did find that the Amish did not have to send
their children to high school. But note: The case did not involve grade
children nor did it involve young people of high school age who wanted to go to
public high schools. As Justice Douglas reminded the court, it would be a horse
of a different color were a case to arise where some Amish children wanted to
go to public high school and their parents were, on religious grounds,
objecting. It is difficult to conceive of a court decision in favor the
parents’ freedom of religion at the expense of the children’s right to attend a
public high school.

The point
is this: There is a realm of religious freedom that exists under the
Constitution by virtue of the first amendment. But the extent of that realm is
decided by the government exercising its judgment about what the good of secular
society requires. So it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be under
this Constitution.

Sunday, May 11, 2014

Here’s the
thing: Today as I was surfing the net, I looked at a web site I have
bookmarked, “The American Conservative,” where there are published essays some
of which are devoted to understanding the American political order and, most
importantly, its underlying principles. For example, there is one entitled,
“Recovering the Founders’ Foreign Policy.” There are others devoted to
distinguishing between the progressives and the founders. And they are or can
be interesting.

But they
seem to have nothing to do with understanding what is really going on in
America’s political arena. For example, I am currently reading a book entitled The Subversives: The FBI’s War on Student
Radicals and Reagan’s Rise to Power,” by Seth Rosenfeld. In this book,
which is based on a bevy of documents the author got via a Freedom Of
Information Act lawsuit and interviews with participants, it becomes clear that
the FBI, with the full cooperation of the established political class, not only
spied on but actively sought to “neutralize” what it deemed “political
radicals,” socialist, communists [allegedly], black power groups, hippies, and
the New Left. In fact, the FBI planted undercover agents in some of these groups,
agents who then took the lead in moving these groups toward violence, which of
course was then blamed on the “radicals.” For example:

“[J. Edgar]
Hoover order his agents to investigate the TWLF [the Third World Liberation
Front] on the ground that it potentially threatened internal security and civil
order. But one of the strike’s most militant leaders had a long – and until now
secret – history of working as a paid FBI informant. His name was Richard Aoki,
and at the bureau’s direction he had infiltrated a succession of Bay Area
radical organizations. He had given the Black Panthers some of their first guns
and weapons training, encouraging them on a course that would contribute to
shootouts with police and the organization’s demise. And during the Third World
Strike, he encouraged physical confrontations that prompted Governor Reagan to
take the most severe law-enforcement measures against the Berkley campus yet –
ones that ultimately would have fatal consequences.” [pp. 418-19]

So, in the
1960’s, the FBI or, more precisely, the national government was involved in
activities meant to neutralize political activity that was otherwise legal that
it thought would “combat perceived threats to the existing social and political
order.” [p. 414] In this particular case, the FBI worked with Ronald Reagan, a
man who claimed as a conservative to distrust “big” or “intrusive” government,
to infiltrate and neutralize political groups that threatened the status quo. And,
just as troubling, this activity had the support of the prevailing political
class, both “left” and “right,” both “liberal” and “conservative.”

What do the
alleged “founding principles” of our political order have to do with any of
this activity? Put differently, why should we wile away our time discussing
those “founding principles” when such activities are taking place? There can be
only reason, as near as I can tell: To direct attention away from these
activities, to make them disappear into the background while we try to
determine whether the “founders” were “progressives” or “natural law”
proponents or some proponents of some other political category that has no
relation to what is actually transpiring in this nation.

Look at
this way: What sense does it make, i.e., in what way is our situation clarified
by labeling Ronald Reagan a “conservative,” an opponent of big, intrusive
government if he was willing to form an alliance with the head of the FBI to
suppress political activity with which he disagreed? I submit such a
categorization of Reagan – or any one else, even the alleged “liberals” – just
obfuscates our situation. It is as if we live in the presence of giant and
constantly running fog machine, which renders us almost blind when it comes to
what is actually happening. And then, when something happens, say something
like 9/11 or the assassination of JFK, we are shocked and we are unable to do
more than shake our heads in disbelief that such a thing could have happened.
And, heaven forbid, for anyone to say something like, “Well, the chickens have
come to roost’ for we didn’t even know we had any chickens or that they were in
danger.

It is a
most interesting state of affairs and it is nice to think that it cannot go on
for very long. But I am afraid that too is as thought that the fog machine
contributes to. Because as it does go on, and on, and on, it is harder and harder
to persuade people that they are not in touch with reality.

Saturday, May 10, 2014

Blood on our hands. Who’d of thunk it? What’s that you say? Some blood is from your dead son? Gee, so sorry, but it had to be done. Even if the war couldn’t be won! Here's a flag for when your spirits sag.We give it with our thanks, no gag.

Monday, May 5, 2014

Here is an email exchange about education that was the
result of a posting of mine on Facebook. First, you have my friend’s
contribution and then there is my response. Enjoy.

“Our kids have jobs that keep them in the public eye
so I can't comment on Facebook.

“””I went to a public college for undergraduate and
private for graduate school. I graduated in 1974 so my experience is as
old as yours. Our kids went to private and public colleges for daughter
and public then private for son. Both finished their doctorates about 5
years ago. Daughter from University of Virginia and son from Harvard.
Both got an excellent education and are married to folks who went to
public university for daughter and private university for son. I frankly don't
see any difference between the level of education that each received at any
point of their education. Because of strides in affirmative education and
pushes by the institutions to diversify, there is much more integration of
social and economic groups than you infer, in my opinion.

Our daughter-in-law worked for several years in
admissions at Tufts and said that their push to diversify was real and strong.
Our son's classmates at Harvard throughout his years there appeared to be
very diverse as well. We spent several occasions with these folks and
they seemed pleased with where they were and cognitive of the doors they would
open for them. (our son) feels that his engineering degree from West
Point and PhD from Harvard got his foot in many doors but (our daughter
) feels that her pure math degree from Bentley and PhD from University of
Virginia in research methods and pure math did the same for her.
Both have zoomed up through their professions at what I view as the
same rate. Both left me in the dust years ago.

So....although I think you may be correct in some
cases I think you are far from the reality of it in the small cohort of our
family. I think that you may be right with the few who think the
institution is more important than the education received but that doesn't last
long in the real world which relies on results more than pedigree.

“I will now descend from my soap box. Harrumph .”

My response:

I may be incorrect, as this has happened in the past, once or twice.
;-) [A joke, I say, as humor doesn't always play well in this virtual world.]
It would be nice to think that this country is not becoming increasingly
inegalitarian but most of the stats don't support that conclusion. Also, while
colleges and universities have shown increasing concern for diversity, at the
same time they have gone up the socio-economic ladder in their search for
students. I saw this at Assumption, know it was happening at places like Boston
College and Holy Cross, and see it clearly here at my alma mater, Wake Forest.
As one of my classmates posted on Facebook, the Wake Forest we went to doesn't
exist any longer and I am pretty sure I would not be as happy today at Wake as
I was from 1964-1968. But I suspect this trend is just a reflection of what has
been happening for past 50 years or so in our society, which has become
increasingly unequal as the middle class and lower class move further and
further away from the upper class, a trend which in my opinion is facilitated
by both Republicans and Democrats, with no end in sight.

C. I did not mean to impugn anyone's efforts to fight this trend nor
to belittle efforts, which work, to increase diversity. In this regard, Wake
Forest is a much different place than it was all those years ago, when there
were very few blacks on campus and no other minorities at all. Today,
Assumption College looks, racially, like what Wake looked like in the 60s. But
Assumption, which began as all male institution, is now about 2/3'ds women and
1/3d men. In that regard, things are much better than they were. So, yes, I
would agree with your daughter that the push for diversity is real and strong,
and has been successful. But it does not seem to extend to much socio-economic
diversity and at times is sacrificed for the sake collecting the better off.
Why?

D. I suspect that much - and personally I would say a lot - of
this at the college and university level is due to the fact that most of them
have become merely business enterprises, more concerned with the bottom line
than anything else. They go where the money is. Up the socio-economic ladder
and big time athletics, the latter of which impacts greatly on quality
education. This is just the way it is. It does impact these institutions,
however. Some years ago, it was said that Holy Cross and Boston College decided
to keep their admissions at 50% male and 50% female. I suppose they did this
because they were concerned with donations later and history indicates that
males give more than females. While I thought this was short-sighted given the
changing roles of women in our society, it was fine with me because it meant
Assumption got some women students we would not have gotten otherwise. But more
often than not I think it is the bottom line that dictates policy. Another
example: Now more than 50% of the professors in the US are adjuncts or in
non-tenure track positions, which is also economically "efficient"
and, of course, empowers the bureaucrats at the expense of the faculty, as
intended. These positions, adjunct and non-tenure track, usually amount to
little more than exploitation and will impact the quality of education. And the
bureaucratization of colleges and universities has increased exponentially,
again, with not an insignificant impact on the quality of education. All of
this will then be hidden by what are being called new measures of
"assessment" which are being imposed on colleges and universities by
federal law. Just another part of the plan to make colleges and universities
businesses and serving businesses, as if that were the goal of "higher
education."

Saturday, May 3, 2014

Below is a
link to an article from the NY Times about some guy at Princeton University
who, apparently, “ignited” a debate over “privilege” because he wrote an essay
objecting to someone else who, allegedly, told him to “check his privilege.” He
seemed to take this as the ultimate put down, leading him to describe his
family’s history going back at least as far as World War II.

Now, to me,
this is weird for a couple of reasons. First, why was Tal Fortgang so riled by
being told to check his privilege? I mean, is his ego so fragile that this
“request” rattled it significantly? I know or read that he is not from Jersey,
but he is in Jersey, where put downs are far more brutal than this. I don’t
know what New Rochelle, N.Y. is like but I guess it doesn’t help young people
develop thick skins.

But, of
course, Mr. Fortgang isn’t really in “Jersey,” is he? He is attending Princeton
University, one of the most elite universities in the nation, to say nothing of
what it is in New Jersey. There is something almost inexplicable about saying
that there is or even could be a debate over “privilege” at Princeton, at least
such a debate where someone was participating who could be said not to be
enjoying the privilege of a Princeton education. Why should anyone take this
particular debate seriously? It would be a lot like taking seriously a debate over
torture between Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. Not much of a debate.

After I
retired from Assumption College, a small, allegedly liberal arts Catholic
college in Worcester, Mass., I did a “part-time” gig at Bridgewater State
University in Bridgewater, Mass., which is part of the Massachusetts state
university system. I had been at Assumption for 21 years and was aware that when
I left the students were no longer part of the same socio-economic class as
when I started. But it was my experience at Bridgewater that brought home to me
just how different, how “elitist,” Assumption and its students had become between
1989 and 2010. This is, I suspect, OK but I wondered if I was witnessing what
in fact was happening throughout our society, a “segregation” of citizens into
two distinct classes whose interaction is, to say the least, limited and whose
experiences are as different as night and day.

If we are
going to have a “debate” over “privilege” then it needs to be a real debate,
not a debate among the privileged over who, within their ranks, are
“privileged” and who are not. If Mr. Fortgang wants to think he is not
“privileged,” and that others should not tell him to “check his privilege,” he
is free to think that way. But that doesn’t change the fact that so long as he
has the privilege of a Princeton education, this privilege distinguishes him
from a great many others who never even had a chance of enjoying this or other
privileges Tal Fortgang has enjoyed and will enjoy. Rather than “checking his
privilege,” I would recommend that Mr. Fortgang “check his [alleged] outrage”
at being, as he put it, spoken down to.

Thursday, May 1, 2014

“Today we live in a
different age, one that so worried Bloom—an age of indifference. Institutions
of higher learning have almost completely abandoned even a residual belief that
there are some books and authors that an educated person should encounter. A
rousing defense of a curriculum in which female, African-American, Latino, and
other authors should be represented has given way to a nearly thoroughgoing
indifference to the content of our students’ curricula. Academia is committed
to teaching “critical thinking” and willing to allow nearly any avenue in the
training of that amorphous activity, but eschews any belief that the content of
what is taught will or ought to influence how a person lives.

“Thus, not only is
academia indifferent to whether our students become virtuous human beings (to
use a word seldom to be found on today’s campuses), but it holds itself to be
unconnected to their vices—thus there remains no self-examination over higher
education’s role in producing the kinds of graduates who helped turn Wall
Street into a high-stakes casino and our nation’s budget into a giant credit
card. Today, in the name of choice, non-judgmentalism, and toleration,
institutions prefer to offer the greatest possible expanse of options, in the
implicit belief that every 18- to 22-year-old can responsibly fashion his or
her own character unaided.”

These passages are from a review by Patrick Deneen
of Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind, long after its publication.
I believe Deneen is wrong in the following ways. First, this is not “an age of
indifference.” That institutions of higher learning are no longer interested in
certain books and authors is not due to indifference but rather to a commitment
to a “practical” education, or what might be called an “economically” driven
education. It is not that the colleges and universities are not interested in a
particular kind of curriculum; rather, it is that they are interested in curricula
that serve the interests of our corporations or the globalized economy. Call it
what you will but this is not indifference.

Hence, the conflicts over curriculum that once
described the institutions of higher education have been short-circuited, as it
were. Like tenure, they are being undermined indirectly, as it were. Evidence
of this is the degree to which now administrators, bureaucrats who have never
been in a classroom or taught, have assumed so much power in these institutions
that it is all-too-common to hear pleas for “shared governance” in these
institutions, pleas most often or always heard coming from the faculty, not
from the bureaucrats. And both of these developments, the rise of a bureaucracy
not populated by former faculty members and the demise of tenure via adjunct
and not-tenure track positions, are in the service of an education that serves
the interests of our corporations.

So, when
Deneen writes that “Today, in the name of choice, non-judgmentalism, and toleration,
institutions prefer to offer the greatest possible expanse of options, in the
implicit belief that every 18- to 22-year-old can responsibly fashion his or
her own character unaided,” he is wrong. What he sees as “the greatest possible
expanse of options” is actually a tremendous narrowing of the options thought
respectable at our institutions of “higher learning.” It is not relativism that
is undermining our institutions of “higher learning.” Rather, it is capitalism
or the alleged demands of globalization. It is not that these institutions
think the young “can responsibly fashion [their] own character unaided.”
Rather, it is that these institutions will fashion their characters for them
and that these “characters” will be thoroughly bureaucratized so that they will
fit into the “globalized” world, the “capitalized,” “corporatized,” or
“bureaucratized” world we live in.

I believe
what Deneen fails to appreciate is how hard it is for humans to embrace what he
calls “relativism” or what Bloom called “nihilism.” Both seem to think that
relativism or nihilism are easy pills to swallow for human beings when in fact
they are not. Yes, humans may say relativistic things, but saying and doing are
two different things and when humans do something, they have to justify those
doings. This is, it seems to me, just human nature. Hence, when Americans held
slaves, they had to justify that and,
as a result, they came up with “theories” of racial inferiority and
superiority. And when Americans had to deal with having “nuked” the Japanese,
they had to embrace notions of Japanese inhumanness. Or to take a simpler
example: One of my professors said, a long time ago, that no one is a
relativist after a dinner guest has stolen some of the family’s silver, no
matter how committed they might be to tolerance or relativism in the classroom!
One could see the same phenomenon occurring after 9/11, when there were no
relativists in the U.S. that I could see.

So, I am
skeptical when I hear people speaking about alleged relativists or nihilists
who are taking over our institutions of higher education. And it is not that
these institutions are not in danger; they are. But the danger does not arise
today, as it did not arise in the past, from relativism or nihilism. Rather, it
arises from prejudiced or parochial notions of what is the just way for human
beings to live. We now have embraced, some of us anyway, the idea that those in
the business of business are the virtuous ones, and the larger and more
profitable the business, the more virtuous are those who control or own it. It
is even said, over and over, that business virtue is political virtue. So why
shouldn’t it be confused with intellectual virtue as well? This is, as strange
as it may seem, what is endangering that which is or should be “higher” about
our educational institutions.